CALL TO ACTION Enough is Enough LET VOLUNTEERS BACK TO HELP
SHELTER PETS SURVIVE
ARC RESCUE SOUNDS THE ALERT:
RETURN VOLUNTEERS TO ACTIVE DUTY IN SHELTERS ACROSS
AMERICA. In response to the pandemic, almost all shelters barred or
limited volunteers at a time when they lost a large percentage of staff. As a
result, many shelter animals died. Our coalition is calling for ALL
shelters to ACTIVELY return the status of volunteers to (AT
MINIMUM) pre-pandemic levels WITHOUT overly burdensome
restrictions.
For example: walking a dog outside should not require a mask. Allowing
volunteers inside ON A REGULAR, SCHEDULED BASIS to take photographs of
pets to share to rescues who are desperately trying to save the pets life
should be a priority. Allowing Volunteers to return to supporting the rescue
pets in shelters is CRITICAL to preventing death of those innocent pets.
Enough is enough.
We call for the head of each and every
shelter to MANDATE their staff to
ACTIVELY return to in-taking and
utilizing volunteers HANDS-ON
immediately: TODAY.
An ENORMOUS GROUNDSWELL of Animal Activists across the country are
taking action – here are their well-reasoned thoughts:
--------------------------
Enough is Enough LET VOLUNTEERS BACK TO HELP SHELTER PETS SURVIVE
To: Mayor Garcetti,
It is time to rescind the mandates at the shelters and allow workers, volunteers to fully administer care
and full service of duties.
The damage to the animals of being kept in cages, not walked or the increase of sickness and euthanasia
is neglect. It's unjustifiable.
There is a staff shortage both city and volunteers, that cannot handle the load, which means, care,
walking dogs and helping adoptions. It puts stress on current staff and causes burn out.
We expect a change of policy immediately to full service of city services for the animals and communities
of Los Angeles. We look forward to this change and the proper care administered to the animals.
Thank you,
The appointment only system has a good point, which is a quality visit and assistance with finding an
adoptable pet. The bad points are canceled appointments, running out of the one hour time slot and not
finishing an adoption, hindrance to others walking in to name a few.
The shelter has to create a fun, encouraging, supportive atmosphere to bring traffic in. Not be a place of
despotism and sorrow.
Thank you for collaborating,
Paul Darrigo
CHULA - Citizens for a Humane Los Angeles
https://www.facebook.com/groups/773416409436730/
------------------------------
FROM:
Kristen Hassen
Favorites · dotsntM8A35ucl A u9pf1t62r: a 0im4 ·
“Why is it so hard to help pets?”
The reason animal shelter volunteer programs desperately need an overhaul
Here’s how it usually works in an animal shelter: Fill out a long application. Wait. Maybe hear back about a volunteer orientation
to be held in the next two months. Maybe be told there are no upcoming orientations. Eventually attend a three-hour seated
orientation in a room with a screen and a canned presentation. Wait. Get invited to start volunteering. Show up. Feel really
confused. Try to figure it out. Get told by (insert any person here) that you’re breaking one or more rules. Maybe walk some dogs
or pet a cat. Either stick it out (all you assertive types) or walk away and spend your valuable free time elsewhere because that
whole experience took a lot of time and just felt bad.
Important to note: Volunteer coordinators are, more often than not, amazing people - they’re innovative, kind, good listeners, and
people who truly care about both pets and humans. The fact that your volunteer program is terrible isn’t their fault. Being a
volunteer coordinator is one of the most important, and hardest jobs in the shelter so let’s just take a minute to say ‘thank you’ to
animal shelter volunteer coordinators. We love you.
The trouble is, they’re powerless over the system they’ve been thrown into and that old system is plagued by arbitrary rules,
barriers of every kind, lack of resources, red tape, and long waits at every turn. Because of this, volunteer coordinators are stuck
in an endless cycle of high volume recruitment, stale onboarding, and training processes, and a ‘weeding out’ process that means
only about 10% of people who want to volunteer ever make it through the hoops required to get that t-shirt and name badge.
Fixing this is going to take a total refresh and rethinking of volunteer programs. Here are just a few of my ideas for how we
transform the old volunteer system into a brand-new world of people helping pets - one free of arbitrary barriers and confined
roles.
1. Volunteer drop-in hours on evenings and weekends. Anyone can come and volunteer, no training is required. During these
times, staff and volunteers can talk about how they can become part of the formal volunteer program and share the opportunities
that are available.
2. Volunteers can foster any pet, any time. I mean, can you imagine a bigger perk? Volunteers can be enrolled as fosters as part of
the volunteer enrollment process so no additional paperwork is needed.
3. Volunteers are recruited to solve the greatest challenges. Long stay dog enrichment and marketing. Socializing fearful cats and
kittens. Bottle-feeding babies as they enter the clinic. Helping people get found pets home without those pets entering the shelter.
Assisting pet owners with rehoming their own pets in lieu of shelter surrender. Contributing to social media. The list of things
volunteers could be doing to solve problems is endless. What if our entire volunteer program was built on identifying expertise
and passion so we could direct volunteers into helping where they are most needed?
4. Volunteer-led leadership. The volunteer programs of the future need more staff resources and more volunteers at the helm.
Volunteer mentors can train new volunteers, run specialty volunteer programs targeted at at-risk groups of pets, and provide
support and guidance to volunteers.
5. Volunteers are trained in customer service, safety, fear-free handling, and culture. Most programs spend very little time in any
of these areas, which is why a lot of volunteers get disgruntled and burned out.
6. Volunteers have a clear process for sharing complaints and concerns and these are taken seriously by shelter leadership.
Volunteers are invited to be part of solving every problem they identify and the shelter transparently shares the challenges and
opportunities so volunteers can realistically spearhead change.
7. The organization says yes to volunteer coordinators and yes to volunteers. The single, greatest problem in volunteer programs
today is our tendency to say no to volunteers for almost every reason imaginable. We have to say yes or work to get to yes, or at
least a middle ground.
8. Volunteers can bring their family members and even other pets, depending on their role and the capacity of the shelter.
Volunteers are not subjected to arbitrary screening processes like background checks. Volunteers do not have to make an up-front
commitment to serving for six months. Volunteers can expect they’ll be met with kindness by other volunteers and staff.
9. Volunteers are expected to follow the same cultural expectations as everyone else in the organization and are held accountable
to treat all staff and members of the public with respect, kindness, and humility. In animal shelters, we must embody the belief
that ‘all are welcome’ and that must mean all. This ethic must also extend to all of the animals in our care.
10. Finally, to fix volunteer programs, we need to totally rethink how we recruit helpers and the inherent bias and discrimination
built into our current processes. We make it hard to help and we subject volunteers to scrutiny that we ourselves could not hold
withstand. We need to address how our beliefs about the socio-economic status drive who can and cannot be considered a
volunteer.
These are a few of my ideas. What are yours?
Xxxx
https://nathanwinograd.substack.com/p/the-growing-threat-of-darkness?s=w
The Growing Threat of Darkness
To the animals’ detriment, shelters refuse to fully open to the public
dog in a filthy kennel at Los Angeles County Department of Animal
Care & Control.
Shelters across the country are complaining that they are at
overcapacity. A coalition in South Carolina has even declared a “state
of emergency.” A spokesperson put it in stark terms: “The lives of
thousands of animals in shelters across South Carolina are at stake.”
While shelters are blaming the public by saying they are surrendering
animals in droves, the data tells a very different story. Pet Point, a
shelter management software used by thousands of shelters and
rescue groups across the country, recently revealed that intake
numbers are still below pre-pandemic levels. “Looking at this data,”
Pet Point’s Vice-President writes, “it doesn't look like it's being driven
by extraordinary intake, as many have perceived.” Given that intakes
are still below pre-pandemic levels, why the logjam?
The Pet Point analysis suggests an answer: inefficiency. Shelters
have not returned to pre-pandemic staffing and practices. Many
shelters have still not fully opened to the public for adoption. That
means animals are not going out the front door as fast as they could.
And not only are some shelters refusing to fully open to the public,
some — like the Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and
Control — have announced that they never will.
The department recently issued a report to the Board of
Supervisors informing them that, if approved, they will no longer allow
members of the public to visit county shelters to look for and reclaim
lost pets, adopt new ones, rescue them from death, or just visit and
play with the animals, unless those individuals have scheduled an
appointment to do so. The department has the support of national
groups like Best Friends Animal Society and the ASPCA, which
are encouraging other shelters to adopt similar policies.
While shelter management in Los Angeles County claims that this
“appointment only” policy will increase lifesaving (somehow), reduce
intakes, and reduce stress for animals by limiting activity and noise
levels, this is misleading. For animals, visitors mean stimulation,
walks, getting played with, and finding homes.
At the same time, the “appointment only” policy reduces their chance
of being adopted and, in a regressive shelter, this is often a death
sentence. According to a shelter watchdog and critic of the new policy,
“At Los Angeles County Animal Care and Control, numerous people
complained about the shelter not returning their calls when they tried
to make adoption ‘appointments.’” The same issue is arising on the
other coast in New York’s equally dysfunctional and regressive animal
shelter. One family attempted “to adopt a dog from [New York City
Animal Care and Control] NY ACC, [but their…] application was
‘pending’ for weeks before [that family] repeatedly called the shelter to
get them to respond.”
This “appointment only” policy has also been criticized because it
locks out “poor people and older people who don't have or are unable
to use online services” from adopting, costing them and the animals a
loving companion. It also erases tremendous gains made by the No
Kill movement over the last decade to force greater public access, as
well as to force better and more sensible adoption/reclaim hours, all of
which have been key to reducing shelter killing nationwide.
But there’s another reason why closing doors to the public is so
dangerous for animals: public scrutiny keeps neglect and abuse in
check. Rescuers, potential adopters, volunteers, and other members
of the public are the eyes, ears, and heart of the community. If they
are not allowed to visit the facility unannounced, animals will suffer in
silence. That’s not conjecture; it’s history.
Abuse Thrives in Darkness
A rabbit furiously tries to drink water from an empty container at the
Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care & Control.
The staff called it “Spinal Monday.”
Several years ago at the Los Angeles County pound, a volunteer
found a rabbit in a back room outside of public view who was suffering
from an exposed spine and being cannibalized by other rabbits. A
subsequent investigation uncovered that the rabbit had been left alive
in her cage for one week in that condition. Also discovered in the cage
was a dead rabbit, his decomposing body covered with flies, and
another rabbit with an eye popping out of his socket who was being
attacked by the others. None of these animals had food or water.
“Shelter” employees claimed to be unaware of these conditions, even
though they were required to clean the cages every day. Out of public
sight is out of mind for staff. During an unannounced visit to the same
facility two years later, attorneys from The No Kill Advocacy Center
found filthy rabbit cages and empty water bowls, apparently once
again “forgotten” in an out-of-the-way back room.
Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care & Control officers
kicking a dog restrained with a hard-wired noose around his neck in
a backroom.
These are not anomalies. Under current Los Angeles County
management, animals have been starved to death; cats have
contracted panleukopenia because they were not given an
examination, treatment, or vaccinations on intake; animals have been
left with torn ears and gouged eyes without rehabilitative care; and
animals have been warehoused in filthy conditions. There’s more,
including staff physically assaulting animals and staff simply clocking-
in and then going home, getting paid for sleeping on the clock, while
animals are left in need. While many of these problems occurred
years ago, others are more recent.
Mr. Pickles, for example, was a young, healthy cat who was
surrendered by his family to the L.A. county pound system. He was
placed in what is known as the “feral” building. The building is behind
a locked gate, inaccessible to the public. There, healthy cats like Mr.
Pickles are housed next to sick cats, ensuring that those who enter
healthy don’t leave that way, if they leave at all.
Mr. Pickles turned out to be very sweet, rubbing up against the bars of
his cage when staff walked by and calling out to them with a soft
meow. He was so pliable, in fact, someone put a pair of Mr. Potato
Head glasses on him and snapped his photo to show others how cute
he was. A volunteer who was given permission to enter the building to
pick up a different cat took a video of Mr. Pickles being friendly. She,
too, saw immediately that despite being labeled “feral,” Mr. Pickles
was social with people. She had hoped the video would get him
moved to a public building for adoption. Others tried too; one of them
writing in large block letters on his cage card: VERY SWEET CAT.
Despite these attempts, staff at the pound killed him with a lethal dose
of barbiturates. In a bid to cover up the malfeasance, Mr. Pickles was
labeled “unadoptable.” “I have personally verified and therefore,
recommend based on the criteria in OPK 120, that this animal is
eligible for PTS,” a staff member wrote on his official paperwork. PTS
— meaning “Put to Sleep” — is a euphemism for killing. OPK 120 is
the policy that authorizes the killing of cats who are alleged to have “a
behavioral or temperamental defect that could pose a health or safety
risk or otherwise make them unsuitable for placement as a pet.”
According to the pound director, cats are only killed in cases of
“severe injury, untreatable illness, or dangerous/wild temperament,” a
claim no one believes; including, I suspect, the shelter director herself.
Mr. Pickles was not injured. He was not ill. He was not dangerous.
And putting aside how cruel it is to kill cats even if they truly are “feral,”
Mr. Pickles was not. It was quite literally written on his cage. But
according to a whistleblower, mislabeling cats is something that
“happens a lot.” It’s easy to do when animals are hidden away from
public view. The only reason we know of Mr. Pickles is because of a
whistleblower, who has since gone silent because their job was
threatened. Without public oversight, shelter staff will have even fewer
practical limits on their power to neglect, to abuse, to kill, and to lie
about it. Any animal that enters the Los Angeles County system faces
the same fate as Mr. Pickles.
A Mission Betrayed
A severely injured dog dragged across the pavement by Los
Angeles County Department of Animal Care & Control officers. The
dog was subsequently killed.
Across the country and over the past 20 years, one primary thing has
forced regressive shelters to improve: the court of public opinion.
When the public hears about neglect, abuse, and killing in their local
shelter, they denounce it and demand changes. It is no surprise then
that regressive, historically abusive pound systems like those in Los
Angeles and New York would reject transparency and accountability
by closing their doors to the unannounced public.
It is equally not surprising that large, national groups like Best Friends
and the ASPCA, are endorsing the effort. Like the ASPCA, Best
Friends has a long history of corruption, including but not limited to:
Defending shelter directors who killed animals in the face of a
rescue alternative.
Opposing efforts to mandate public-private partnerships between
municipal pounds and non-profit No Kill organizations that
would have saved roughly 25,000 animals a year in New York.
Protecting shelter management in the City of Los Angeles when
that shelter was killing community cats and opposing litigation
that would have forced them to stop.
Falsely claiming Los Angeles city shelters are No Kill, shielding
them from scrutiny for abandonment, killing, neglect of duty,
and threatening to arrest rescuers.
And promoting policies at shelters intended to silence rescuers
and volunteers.
Their embrace of diminished transparency and accountability is par for
the course.
A Worrying Trend
A cat abandoned in the parking lot of Los Angeles Animal Services
when the person trying to surrender him was turned away because
the pound closed its doors for much of the year. A rescuer trying to
help the cat was told by staff that she needed a permit to trap him,
would not be given a permit, and was not allowed to even provide
food or water on threat of prosecution. Other shy cats were not so
“lucky” as the pound was under a court order to kill even healthy
“feral” cats. And yet, Best Friends falsely claimed that the city is No
Kill.
In the past two decades, shelters that have fully invested in lifesaving
— comprehensively implementing the programs and services of the
No Kill Equation — have achieved placement rates greater than 95%
and as high as 99%. Collectively, these achievements have helped
lead to a decline in killing nationwide of 90% from its high water mark
of 16 million in the 1970s. It has been called “the single biggest
success of the modern animal protection movement.”
But that puts organizations and shelters that have not embraced
comprehensive reforms at a terrible disadvantage and under greater
public scrutiny. By turning away animals in need, including blind cats
found walking around lost in circles; refusing lost dogs, telling
finders to release them back on the street; failing to pick up kittens left
abandoned on sidewalks; and more, these shelters can claim reduced
intakes and higher placement rates, improving their statistics at the
expense of animals.
For this reason, higher “placement rates” are no longer a guarantee of
a job well done. Instead of evidence of hard work and a commitment
to No Kill, these numbers can be the result of turning people and
animals away, mischaracterizing animals like Mr. Pickles as a threat to
public safety, limiting the flow of incriminating information by hiding
abuse from the public, and threatening rescuers and volunteers who
would otherwise expose inhumane conditions or other mistreatment.
And it is by design. Indeed, that just may be how Best Friends intends
to (falsely) claim America has achieved a No Kill nation, something it
is promising will occur by 2025, all so that it can fundraise from a
caring, but unsuspecting, public to the tune of tens of millions of
donation dollars every year.
